Last week, NPR's Brian Naylor spoke with former Delaware Sen. Ted Kaufman, who was then-Sen. Joe Biden's chief of staff and a key player in the negotiations that led to the 1994 ban on assault-style weapons (which expired in 2004). Passage of such a bill now, Kaufman said, is "going to be much more difficult than 1994." Back then, 46 House Republicans supported the ban — "a total that's unimaginable now," Brian reported. Republicans control the House. President Obama's fellow Democrats control the Senate.

The White House has said it supports reinstating the ban. The National Rifle Association makes the case that the Second Amendment makes such legislation unconstitutional and that "the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."